


The Narrow Path

by Saucery



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Asphyxiation, Assassins & Hitmen, Badwrong, Bloodplay, Bodyguard, Borderline Sociopathy, Breathplay, Consent Issues, D/s, Dark, Discipline, Dom/sub, Dominance, Drama, Dubious Consent, Immobility, M/M, Magic, Marathon Sex, Mind Control, Mindfuck, Moral Ambiguity, Obedience, Orgasm Control, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Pseudo-History, Psychology, Rape/Non-con Elements, Romance, Sex Magic, Sexual Content, Sexual Slavery, Silence Kink, Slavery, Spells & Enchantments, Stockholm Syndrome, Submission, Violence, Wizards - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-04
Updated: 2014-07-04
Packaged: 2018-02-07 09:42:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1894368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saucery/pseuds/Saucery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The path of love is so narrow that two cannot walk upon it.</p><p>Or, the one in which Q is a wizard and Bond is his pet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Narrow Path

* * *

 

"Why, if it isn't the princess and her hound." The man steps out into the clearing, the faint firelight glinting off his many daggers, two of which are in his hands. Most assassins don't make themselves visible to their potential victims, but then, assassins sent after wizards know better than to even imagine remaining unseen. Q has been aware of this one for the past two hours, tracking them stealthily through the woods.

Not stealthily enough, alas.

Q curls his fingers in Bond's hair, continuing to stroke it, as is his wont after they've had their customary supper of roasted quail and Bond is kneeling obediently at Q's feet, fully-fed and biddable. Now, Bond sits still under his touch, deceptively quiet, but Q knows that his every muscle has coiled in preparation for attack.

"Why," Q remarks, mildly, "if it isn't a fool that mistakes a wolf for a hound."

"Got teeth, has he?" The assassin - most likely one of Silva's, given his swagger - leers. "Does he sink 'em into your pretty little shoulders when he ruts into you?"

Q tuts. "There's no need to be uncouth. You're here to kill me; I'm in no mood to be killed. Let's settle this like civilized folk, shall we?"

"Civilized?" The man guffaws, twirling his blades, talking to Q but keeping his gaze fixed on Bond. He knows where the threat will come from. "And how do civilized folk settle things?"

"By murder, of course." Q scratches a nail across Bond's nape. Bond shivers; his eyelids dip.

"Funny, that," the assassin grins, launching a knife that Bond barely seems to move before catching, a blur followed by a careful laying down of the knife in front of Q, like an offering. The assassin simply draws another one from his myriad collection, considering Bond, as if Bond is a particularly interesting target for target-practice. "I must be more civilized than the queen 'erself, given all the murderin' I do."

"No doubt," Q murmurs, as Bond catches and lays down another knife. And another. This is getting tiresome - boring, even. The assassin, growing impatient, is drawing closer. Soon, he will run out of weapons. When that happens, he will have to take Bond on in hand-to-hand combat, at which point things will be over very quickly, indeed.

"Clever of you, hirin' a bodyguard, given that wizards can't fight worth shit."

"On the contrary," Q says, "I can do more damage with my magic in my morning robes than you can do in a year's worth of battles. Granted, I may not be able to kill directly, but... if I wasn't dangerous in a far more fundamental way, Silva would hardly be sending you after me, would he?"

The assassin scoffs. "What can be more dangerous than death?"

"Knowledge," Q replies, just as the assassin throws his last knife.

The assassin is panting, by now, a thin sheen of sweat springing forth on his forehead as he settles into a fighting stance. He makes a beckoning motion. "Come on, then," he spits at Bond, trying and failing to hide that he's rattled by Bond's utter lack of discomposure.

Bond does not budge. Q hasn't given him his orders, after all.

"What, can't he hear me? I heard you was dumb, hound, but I didn't know you was deaf, too." The bits of polish have worn off the assassin's accent, like varnish beneath repeated strikes of an axe, but the wonder of it is that Bond hasn't even fought the assassin, yet. Not really. The axe-blade has, thus far, been sheathed.

"He doesn't speak unless he is spoken to," says Q, "because, unlike some people, he has manners."

"I'll teach 'im manners."

"Excellent. He'll teach you how to die. A fair trade."

The assassin snarls and leaps, but makes it no more than half a foot towards Q before he's on the ground, clutching at his ribs. Even Q - and Q has wizard-sight - had scarcely seen Bond move. That is what makes Bond so very beautiful.

Well, that and watching Bond kill.

"Kill him," Q says, soft as a benediction.

Bond does.

It's swift and bloody, as it always is, and Bond's face, when he returns to kneel beside Q, is spattered with red.

Q tips it up to lick it clean. He's thorough about it, his tongue tracing the corners of Bond's clear, animal eyes and the angles of that velveteen, shaven jaw. Finally, when Q reaches his mouth, Bond makes a sound - something muted and needy - and Q doesn't have to glance downward to know that Bond is desperately aroused.

"You're not my bodyguard, are you?" Q asks him. "You're my thrall."

Bond doesn't say anything, pupils dark and breath escaping him in short, sharp gasps, every ounce of his attention fixed on Q's lips. He wants them on him, does he?

"Say it," Q whispers, and cups Bond's chin. "You're my thrall."

"I'm your thrall," Bond answers, voice hoarse with disuse, for there isn't much point in hearing a wolf talk, is there? Not unless it's for these entertaining games.

Q pushes him away, gently, and smiles at the brief, futile clenching of Bond's fists. There's still something of the man, in there, and every glimpse makes Q want to reward him, perversely, for maintaining some spark of humanity in spite of Q's enchantments. Mutually agreed-upon though they may have been.

Perhaps one day, Bond - thus named by Q because of his, ah, 'bond' - will break free, and that day will spell Q's doom. But it is unlikely, for not only is Q powerful, but Q is also persuasive, and pleasure is the most powerful persuasion of all.

"Strip," says Q, "and lie down on our pallet."

Bond obeys with his usual efficiency, and soon he is naked and erect on the fireside pallet, lit all red and gold - red for the blood and gold for his skin. Exquisite.

Q sheds his own cloak, and then the rest of his clothing, knowing that the light gilds his own form pleasingly, his slender limbs smooth and supple as the branches of a young birch tree.

Bond's fists are clenching and unclenching, again, with the effort not to touch, not to so much as ejaculate without permission, but the liquid that wells from his helpless erection is beyond his control, and thus beyond his discipline.

What flawless discipline it is.

It doesn't shatter, even when Q does apply his mouth to Bond's skin, to Bond's throat, to every stray speck of blood on Bond's wrists and forearms. He washes Bond with his tongue, as careful as he'd been earlier, until Bond is cleansed of all signs of sin save the one they are currently committing, until Bond's thighs are flexing with the need to thrust, to fuck.

So Q lets him, settling on his own belly and glancing back at Bond, who has risen to his knees behind Q, dizzy and dazed-looking, quite without any command. Hm. A disobedience that should, theoretically, be punished - but perhaps Q can set a rhythm that is punishing enough.

He makes Bond rut into him, then, just as the assassin had said, with Bond's teeth set into his shoulder, his hips snapping with enough force to rock Q forward on his knees. That still isn't as forceful as Q prefers, however, so Q forbids Bond from climaxing until Q himself has climaxed once, twice, thrice.

The sky is lightening in the east and Q is delightfully sore by the time he allows Bond to reach his peak, which Bond does with a vicious abandon that nearly cleaves Q in two. And in the midst of it, Q tells Bond to wrap his hand around Q's throat and squeeze, until Q is almost blind with it, airless and trapped like Bond must be, the edges of his vision blackening like burning parchment, and it's only when they both slump onto the pallet that Bond releases him, because it's only then that Q's magic permits Bond to release him.

"Did you like that?" Q rasps past the bruise he can feel around his neck. "Did you like nearly killing me? Nearly freeing yourself? You did, didn't you?"

"No," says Bond, and for a single, seething instant, Q _hates_ him, until he remembers that Bond cannot lie. "No, no, no," Bond keeps saying, hushed and frantic, against Q's ear.

It is then that Q realizes Bond is shaking.

"Oh, you're ridiculous," Q groans, turning over and taking Bond in his arms, Bond's body solid and sweaty and stubbornly blood-scented, despite all the other scents on him, now. "Perfectly incapable of playing a simple game."

"That was not simple."

Q startles, momentarily, at the too-human answer - but Bond's eyes, when he looks into them, are as blank and blue as ever. "Perhaps you're deceiving me," Q wonders, aloud. "Or, worse, I'm deceiving myself."

But Bond says nothing further, merely skating a palm up Q's side and down again, slowly, as if Q is the child that needs soothing.

Q huffs. "At any rate, you'll be up first, tomorrow, to clear that horrid corpse away before I wake up." The corpse doesn't offend him, all the way on the other side of the fire, in total shadow - and they'll be leaving camp by noon, anyway, completing the remainder of their trek to Queen M's capital city. Nevertheless, the task should give Bond something to do, something suitably dreary to focus on.

Q casts his wizard-sight out, towards the capital, past the fortress walls and into the palace, uncovering secrets and plots ere they hatch. Q can only arm himself with information, but it is, in the end, the most effective armament of all. If M hadn't summoned Q back to the hive to settle this Silva business, Q would still be traipsing around the greater continent with his pet wolf in tow.

His pet wolf appears to have fallen asleep, a crushing weight on top of Q, but Q, casting the fishing-net of his mind ever-farther, appreciates having an anchor to remind him of his own body, of the vessel he must return to.

How did he return to himself, before Bond?

He can't seem to recall.

It's alarming, except that it isn't. Not at all.

Curious, is it not? That the thrall should hold the master enthralled?

"Perhaps you're the wizard," Q mumbles, drowsily, "and it is my control that is an illusion you have crafted, to enchant me."

Bond, presently covering Q like the world's heaviest, hottest blanket, is too deep in sleep to reply. 

 

* * *

  
**fin.**

 

**Author's Note:**

> Like my writing? Want updates? Follow me on [Tumblr](http://saucefactory.tumblr.com/)!


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